You are currently viewing the archive for November 2004.
I just got a scam email asking me to look after $7 million. Nothing unusual… except they accidentally attached the list of emails they’re spamming. 496 addresses in a file headed “Email Spider Easy — Targeted Email Extract Expert”. It includes some addresses that look sort of familiar, like the ABC’s Afternoon Show, and the CSIRO reception. Weird.
Juan Cole criticised MEMRI, and for his trouble copped a threatening letter. His employer was also threatened. Somebody else posted his personal information online, and encouraged others to hassle him. Whether it’s a big issue like Israel/Palestine, or a small issue like Pandagate, the tactics of the Right are always the same.
Ireland’s taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, recently announced that he is “one of the few socialists left in Irish politics”. HAHAHAHAHA! Eamonn McCann says, “If Bertie Ahern is a socialist the moon is a balloon, Ian Paisley is a member of Opus Dei and Tony Blair never told a lie in his life.” He governs with the support of Ireland’s most right-wing parliamentary party, and is also allied with post-fascist European parties. Here’s an entertaining explanation for his sudden conversion.
Richard Giles will be pleased — I bought an iPod. Her name is Rosa, she dresses in black, and she sings a mean Pearl Jam cover.
At the risk of sparking another flurry of threatening emails, I’m going to have to link to Thoughts from my Anus. (Thanks, Squin.)
It’s a maelstrom (or should that be malestorm?) of adolescent chicken hormones around here since my sister decided to give us a cockerel. He’s a Plymouth Rock, which is a very posh heritage strain, and excellent eating apparently. He loves our Black Australorp, Barry White, and tries to root her all the time, which seems OK with her.
Predictably, Wickham has got himself into some trouble. He has been behaving in a dead normal teenage rooster fashion at about 5:30 am each day. Unfortunately, this behaviour is carried out fairly close to the neighbours’ bedroom window. We told them that we had received a surprise gift when my sister gave him to us, and asked them to tell us if they had any problem and he would be dinner.
Despite some calling around last night, I had to take Wickham around to my bloodthirsty sister this morning (after, would you believe, a little weep - I didn’t tell her that).
She had that scary bloodthirsty look in her eyes again, and three books open to “How to kill chickens” on the lounge.
Wickham turned out to be a bit tough, as predicted, so he became soup. Very tasty soup, apparently. At least his death was not in vain.
I have resisted the temptation to put the feathers on the neighbours’ door step with some red paint and a large sign saying “CHICKEN KILLERS LIVE HERE”.
The really gross bit is that his carcass was later fed to my sister’s chickens. Chickens LOVE meat. Even chicken. Perverts.
The circle of life…
Joseph says the Jesus and Mary food manifestations are “an indication that people who search obsessively for the least signs of deific life can’t cook for shit.” I guess that goes for Hello Kitty fans, too. (Thanks Amanda.)
“Even on the most generous interpretation of comparative advantage, I don’t think returning packaging material and scrap to your suppliers can form a sustainable basis for trade.”
James Gallaway makes an interesting observation in this week’s New Matilda:
Where once Senator Amanda Vanstone’s title as Minister for Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs had concluded with the words, ‘Minister assisting the Prime Minister on Reconciliation’ the rubric has been quietly altered since the recent election to read, ‘Minister assisting the Prime Minister in Indigenous Affairs’, only.
It’s no longer about reconciliation. It’s about white government officials dictating the affairs of Aboriginal people. Henceforth, I shall refer to John Howard as the Chief Protector of Aborigines, and Amanda Vanstone as the Assistant Protector.
Ugh. I’ve just read Matt Hutaf’s offensive article about the fact that “foreigners have no business running our country.” Of course, his definition of “foreigner” includes a person who moved to America with their parents, aged 5; was brought up in America; went to school in America; went to college in America; took up American citizenship; has a career in America; married an American; and is raising an American-born family in America. Damn those immigrant traitors!
There seems to be a bit of a backlash against blog meetups. Alex White says the idea of meeting internet people in meatspace is worrying:
While I enjoy reading what others have got to say, I can’t really say the idea of meeting internet-strangers in a bar and talking “blogtalk” excites me. I’d rather not have my spleen stolen and sold at a European organ-auctionhouse thank you very much.
I’ve met quite a few bloggers — Jason Soon, Mark Gallagher, Chris Sheil and Alan Anderson from interstate, and quite a few Perth bloggers, too. I still have my spleen, but I’ve also made some interesting acquaintances and friends.
I suspect Alex’s real complaint is this:
I’m probably not the kind of bloke intended as the target for a Grogblogging invite (what with this being a small blog and all).
To which I say: nonsense! The whole point of meetup events is to get everyone involved together in one place. To me, it’s about rejecting the A-List elitism of the blogosphere — I read a whole lot of small blogs, and many of them are far more interesting because I now know the people behind them.
But on that subject, Liam Hogan’s tongue-in-cheek criticism of the recent Sydney event raises a good point:
You expect to be taken seriously as a medium, but you exclude from your ranks all those who are not able to come out on a particular night. You make your organising of networking a once-off rather than a regular exercise of power sharing.
Meetups work best if they’re regular. People can turn up when they can make it, and skip it when they can’t. Our Perth Weblogger Meetup Group has about fifty members, and about a dozen people turn up from month to month, though it’s never the same dozen.
It also makes it easier to organise one-off special events. People don’t get left off invitation lists, because anyone can join the group and every member gets the invitations. Everyone — including (especially) Alex White and other “small” bloggers — should join their Meetup group, and turn up for a chat with other bloggers every now and then.
And speaking of special meetup events, don’t forget we’re going bowling tonight.
Update: The dickheads who told Dreadnought not to bother organising a Melbourne meet can get stuffed. Good on Agent FareEvader for pressing ahead.
The fundies are still posting several essays a day on my post about Creationism. It’s hard to take the discussion seriously when one of the main participants writes on his own blog:
Life started 6000 years ago, it took 6 days for all of creation to be completed and there is no evidence contrary to this position.
He also said, in this comment:
At one time humankind believed that we had 152 ‘vestigal’ organs, now that list is virtually non-existant, we once believed the world was flat, we once were sure that Newtonian physics ruled the universed. We’ve been proved wrong before, I’m pretty sure it can happen again.
Yeah, that’s the point. We used to believe in Creationism, but we were proved wrong. Should we still teach kids that people have 152 vestigal organs, or that the world is flat, in the interests of “informed choice”?
But later he tells us:
I think that … there is no reason for anyone to respect/believe the viewpoint of creationists…
Well, okay then. Finally we’ve reached agreement.
But none of the comments have a patch on the Assemblies of God’s Queensland Senate candidate. Chris from work pointed me towards a newsletter (pdf, p9) in which John Lewis explained why he supports teaching superstition as science:
If we teach our kids that they’re highly developed monkeys, why should we be surprised when they act like them.
These guys have a Senator. And they want to put Creationism in schools to stop kids acting like monkeys. What I want to know is, why doesn’t God just smite the little bastards?
Bloggers go bowling: Fairlanes Perth, Wednesday, November 24 at 7:00pm. $20.50 includes bowling and finger food. See you there.
When it is 26.3°C at half past midnight, it is too. hot.
